


Death & The Magician

by Theoroark



Series: The Deck [1]
Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: F/F, Getting Together, Suicide mention, Team Talon (Overwatch)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-01
Updated: 2020-02-01
Packaged: 2021-02-27 21:15:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,119
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22512346
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Theoroark/pseuds/Theoroark
Summary: Sombra getting hired by Talon, and getting to know the Widowmaker.
Relationships: Sombra | Olivia Colomar/Widowmaker | Amélie Lacroix
Series: The Deck [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1619719
Comments: 12
Kudos: 45





	Death & The Magician

Sombra comes to Talon expecting a challenge. Sure, she’s had Los Muertos eating out of her palm since she was nine. But a regional gang whose message she half-believes in is one thing. A global terrorist organization with veins spiraling through almost every other major power is a very, very different beast. Rejecting their offer was never an option, for that very reason. But as Sombra flies to Rome, she’s nervous in a way she hasn’t really been since the days following the security breach. When all she’s up against are guns and knives or maybe a bricked PC, it’s very easy to feel like she has nothing to lose. When something is capable of truly seeing her, she’s forced to remember that she still has her freedom. 

So her nerves are sparking as she’s lead through the Talon base. But within a minute of her interview, before the entirety of the Talon council, Sombra’s completely at ease. The council sits around their heavy oak table and tries to intimidate her in their genteel way. It’s hilarious. They may be sitting in the dark, in their poorly lit conference room, but Sombra’s good at reading people. She sees every one of them right away. Vialli and Maximilien are only here for the money, and they’re both too gutless to do anything meaningful with it when they succeed. O’Deorain is here to soothe her ego. She’s staked her entire sense of identity around being smarter than anyone else, and that will make it obscenely easy for Sombra to outsmart her. Korpal is here solely to build up his personal empire, and he wants it badly enough that everyone else at the table clearly sees it too. He’s so unlikable that Sombra won’t have to lift a finger, someone’s bound to take him out for her eventually.

And then there’s Gabriel Reyes. Since the third Doomfist is out of the picture, he’s the only one Sombra’s been interested in meeting. Reyes blends into the shadows around the table, his scuffed white mask almost floating in the air. He doesn’t say anything and Sombra can’t see his face, but she knows he’s watching her. She knows who he is, and knows he knows she knows. He worked intelligence and for all the organization’s faults, Sombra was never able to break into Blackwatch’s systems. He doesn’t try any passive aggressive barbs or threats like the others but he’s the one who worries her most. If she were him, she wouldn’t want someone like her at her side. She’d want to keep the little secrets she had left.

He most have something else left to lose, though. Because Reyes says nothing, and she’s hired.

The council grumbles about, but they’re fine with her existing as a semi-autonomous entity. They give her a suite though, with an office and a small living space. Reyes walks her to it and as Sombra steps over the threshold, she half expects a grate to spring up behind her in the doorway, walling her in. 

Instead, Reyes leans against the doorway and says, “You should be careful.”

Sombra turns and smiles sweetly at him. “Why’s that?”

“Talon demands loyalty,” he says. “Any personnel who aren’t as distinguished as you– leaving Talon isn’t an option for them.”

“But I am that _distinguished._ Right?”

Reyes ignores her. “It doesn’t matter what you do for us. If you want to cut and run, you’ll be an enemy.”

She gives him an amused look. “I just got hired. Are you such a shit boss that you think I’ll be jumping ship so soon?”

Reyes sighs. “Just show us you’re one of us,” he says. Then he leaves. Sombra gets her equipment set up in the office. She flies back to Dorado that night. 

She does end up spending a decent amount of time at the Talon base. It’s well-equipped and she still isn’t sure how secure her Dorado setup is. But she doesn’t know how Gabe expects her to be one of them. The Talon staff and soldiers are boring, for the most part. All sullen or dumb. She’s not one of them, and she would have hoped that was obvious. 

There are exceptions. She likes Baptiste right away. Maybe it’s their similar backgrounds– but then again, most of Talon’s foot soldiers are war orphans, desperate for any way to rise up in a world that tossed them down. But unlike them, Baptiste actually has a sense of humor about it. He’s right to, frankly. They were orphaned in a war that killed millions and left both sides unhappy and still hating each other. It’s funny. Sombra’s glad someone here is smart enough to see that. 

The weirdest thing is how even though he’s smart enough to see how pointless everything is, he’s still nice. Everyone at Talon seems to like him, will always come up and say hi when he and Sombra go out for drinks. And even with his stupid conscience, he still just laughs and shakes his head when Sombra tells him about the heinous shit she pulls. 

Sombra likes hanging out with Baptiste, she likes working with Gabe— he brings her on missions a lot, and she teases him and he sighs dramatically. She has people at Talon she enjoys well enough. Then she finally meets the Widowmaker. 

Sombra knew the story of Amélie Lacroix. When a prominent Overwatch agent died, she had slipped into the Talon servers, found nothing that concerned her, and slipped out. She hadn’t even thought about it when she took the job, frankly. But one day she walks into the armory and sitting on a bench, a massive rifle on her lap, is a blue woman. She looks up at Sombra and narrows her eyes. 

“I don’t know you,” she states. Sombra gives a little wave. 

“Sombra.”

“That’s not a real name.”

“What’s yours?” The Widowmaker looks down at her gun. Sombra grins. “I’m the hacker they brought on, month or so ago. Nice to meet you, Widow.”

“Reyes told me about you,” Widow says. Sombra sits down next to her. Widow tilts her head up– not annoyed, even though Sombra likes to annoy people like her when she’s getting to know them. People like Widow and Gabe, needling always elicits more than flattery. But even though Widow doesn’t seem welcoming, necessarily, she doesn’t seem bothered that Sombra’s suddenly so close. 

“What’d he say about me?” Sombra asks. 

“He said you were very talented.”

“That all?”

“No,” Widow says. Then she stands and slings her rifle over her shoulder. “It was nice to meet you, Sombra,” she says. Then she leaves. 

Sombra thinks about her after that. She thinks about her a lot. One could say it’s because Widow’s an objectively interesting figure. Reyes was close with Lacroix, and now here he is fighting alongside Lacroix’s wife and killer. There’s a story there, an angle Sombra could take to find out more about Reyes, or blackmail him or something. It’s something that should interest her. 

But the real reason she’s interested comes out over drinks with Baptiste. She asks him if he’s talked to the Widowmaker and he shakes his head, frowning. “I don’t think she really talks to anyone,” he says. 

“Has anyone tried talking to her?”

Baptiste gives her a look. “I mean. You remember the whole ‘she’s an emotionless killing machine’ thing, right?”

“Yeah,” Sombra says. “But she’s hot too.”

Baptiste puts his head in his hands. Sombra grins and slings an arm over his hunched back.

“You’re going to die trying to get laid,” he says, his voice muffled.

“Please. I’m going to get laid AND die, at the worst.” 

Baptiste drags his hand across his face as he pulls himself up. “I just– is it just the thrill of it? You just want to be able to say you fucked her?”

Sombra frowns. Because she doesn’t know, is the thing. Widow’s certainly hot. But Sombra’s not an idiot and Baptiste’s not wrong. She can get laid easy, she wouldn’t be putting her neck out just for pussy. 

It’s that she wants to get to know Widow, she realizes. Reading about a lethal marriage between a French military operative and his trophy wife had held schadenfreude, but no real interest for Sombra. For some reason actually seeing the trophy wife in person, alive and moving about the world, was fascinating. And it made Sombra like her. 

Baptiste is watching her, and turning serious as Sombra sits in silence. She shakes out of it and flashes him a smile. “Guess I’m just curious,” she says. 

Baptiste nods. His ridiculous fruity drink came with a little umbrella, and he stirs that around now as he thinks. “Never been on any missions with her,” he says. “But I can ask around. See if anyone knows anything.”

“It’s okay,” Sombra tells him. She knows he’s offering without any expectation of a favor in return. It’s weird, but it’s charming. She doesn’t need it though. The finding out is the fun part. 

-

After that, Sombra starts taking an interest in Widow. She listens when people mention her. She flips through Talon files to try to find out what she can about the Widowmaker Project, and is both horrified and amused by O’Deorain’s kindergarten methods of bioengineering. The most interesting thing she finds out, though, is that Widowmaker and Reaper work together often. 

Gabe is funny. All those people on the council, she could peg the second they opened their mouths. Gabe’s grumpy and sad and hates loudly and with a passion. He should be just as easy to nail down. But she always feels like she’s missing something with him. 

So she tries a new tack, the next time she sees him. He gives her data on a cyborg rights organization they’ve been tracking and tells her to figure out if they’re useful. He sits there waiting, clearly not giving a shit, until an image of a woman with white hair flashes across the screen. Then he leans forward, a hand on Sombra’s shoulder, and says, “Stop.”

Sombra stops and looks between Gabe and the screen. It takes her a moment. But then it clicks. The woman is Overwatch Agent Sojourn. 

“This why you’re having me look into this?” Sombra asks. 

“No,” Gabe says. He releases her shoulder and leans back, his face tense. “But it’s good to know.”

Sombra hums and sizes him up. Little wisps of smoke are coming off him, something she’s learned is a stress sign for him. “You know, Overwatch did a humanitarian mission in Dorado once,” she says casually. 

Gabe looks down at his lap. “They did a lot of those.”

“I’m sure they did,” Sombra says. “They flew in and landed in the slums. Real production. Their PR people made sure not to capture the roof one of their plane’s clipped into, when they were taking pictures.” She smiles and hovers her cursor over Sojourn’s picture. “They handed out bears to all the kids. Loved mine. But even then, thought it was a little bullshit they flew in on planes that cost more money than I’d ever known, and then they just gave me a toy with their logo on it and left.”

Gabe looks up and there’s something in his face Sombra hasn’t seen before. “I’m sorry,” he says, and Sombra realizes it’s pity. It makes her sick. 

“Don’t be,” she says. She clicks away from Sojourn’s picture. “Like I said. Loved the bear. And it’s done now.”

“It’s not, though,” Gabe says. “I always told Morrison we needed to be more active. He just left that all to me, and focused on keeping Overwatch looking pretty. And now look what that’s fucking done.”

There’s anger in his voice now and that’s more familiar to Sombra. She likes this better. It’s funny, not insulting. What does he have to be angry about? You need to get hurt to get angry, and midnight never came to any watchpoint. And the two of them aren’t friends. Her and Baptiste and millions others growing up desperate and alone never hurt him.

“Yeah, well, it happened,” she tells him. “So we just gotta deal with it now, right? And I think I’m doing pretty good.”

“It shouldn’t have happened,” he says. 

“But it did. And I lived. And I got better because of it. Look.” She pulls up her hair and turns, exposing the start of her cybernetic spine. “O’Deorain can barely put together an arm with all her PhDs, and I did this couch surfing when I was twenty. Because I had to. Because I got real smart to survive. And that’s a lot smarter than I would have with the nice, cozy life she had. And so I’m going to do a lot fucking more than she does.” 

Sombra drops her hair and turns back around. Gabe is smiling. A little sad, but no pity now. “What?”

“You sound so much like Ogundimu right now,” he says. “I knew you’d fit in.” She blinks and before she can collect her thoughts, Gabe stands up. “Get a report to me over the weekend. I trust you’ll do this right.”

He leaves Sombra alone. She doesn’t think she learned anything more about him, and she thinks he probably learned too much about her. She mindlessly flips through files for another few minutes, then gives up and pours herself some wine. She’s halfway through the glass before she picks up her holovid and types out a text. 

>***: This is Sombra. Want to meet up?

Immediately, ellipses pop up, then disappear. After a minute, they reemerge, steady this time. And a minute later Sombra gets a text. 

>+1 33: Yes. Where?

Sombra smiles and downs her glass. 

-

Talon’s central base is a repurposed cathedral on the outskirts of Rome, a studiously preserved thing that sits atop a massive underground network of hangars, labs, and ominous conference rooms. The spires of the cathedral form a mountain range that Sombra can settle into. She watches the sun dip beneath the Roman skyline, turning everything dusky gray and causing streetlights and headlights to spark up. She waits for maybe an hour, fucking around on her holovid, until finally a grappling hook sinks into the shingles and Widowmaker pulls herself up. She’s wearing leggings and a hoodie, even though the heat of the July day hasn’t burned out yet. 

“I figured you’d be able to get up here,” Sombra says as she puts her holovid away. Widow walks across the tiles, almost on pointe, and settles next to her. 

“They wouldn’t let me go up to high places, the first couple months I was with them,” Widow says. Sombra frowns. 

“Why? That seems like it’s kind of necessary for a sniper.”

“They were worried I would jump,” Widow says simply. Sombra isn’t sure if she’s stating it so baldly because Widow knows Sombra makes it her business to know everything, or because shame’s been programmed out of Widow. Sombra sits and thinks for a moment. 

“But they gave you a gun,” she says finally. And Widow laughs. It’s the first time Sombra’s heard her laugh. It’s quiet, like Widow’s stifling herself. It’s nice. Sombra wants more. 

“They didn’t need to worry anyway,” Widow says. “I liked this.”

“Sitting on a roof?”

“The job,” Widow says. She doesn’t laugh this time, but she smiles. “My life was boring before. This isn’t. I wouldn’t leave.”

Sombra nods. “I can see that,” she says. “And I can see Gabe getting hysterical about you like that.”

“It was him,” Widow says. “How did you know?”

“I actually just had that kind of conversation with him.”

“About me?”

“No, but maybe I should have, since you two are talking about me all the time.” Widow rolls her eyes. Sombra presses on. “About La Medianoche.”

Widow winces and Sombra feels a twinge of annoyance. “That’s right. You would have lived through that.”

“Yeah.”

“It was awful.”

“That’s what he said.”

“It never should have happened.”

Sombra laughs. “That’s what he said, too.”

Widow cocks her head. “You don’t think that?”

“I think it doesn’t matter if it should have or not, does it?” Sombra says. “It happened. And I can be like Gabe and bitch and moan about how unfair it all is, or I can move on and do shit with my life.”

Widow blinks. Sombra looks away. She’s had one glass of wine, and her conversation with Gabe was before that. She has no excuse for talking this much. 

At least Widow’s hot. At least that’s kind of an excuse. 

“I always thought not feeling much about it was bad,” Widow says slowly. “Like I was repressing something.”

“You aren’t supposed to feel at all, right?” Widow stares at her balefully. Sombra cracks a smile. “Heh. So O’Deorain couldn’t even do that right, huh?”

“So you don’t think it’s just repression, then?” Widow says, ignoring her. 

“Fuck if I know. But I mean, if you’re doing what you want and you like–“ Sombra shrugs. “Does it matter?”

Widow is silent for a moment. “I do like it,” she says eventually. 

“I was wondering,” Sombra says. “Your file said you were brainwashed–“ Widow raises an eyebrow and perhaps Sombra should have been more coy with her snooping, but it feels like they’re past that, “–and O’Deorain called you brainwashed. But you didn’t seem it to me.”

“Does that matter?”

“Yeah.” 

“Why?” Widow asks. “I liked being Gérard’s wife. Now I think I’d hate that. Isn’t it the same, if I’m killing because I like it, or because I think I like it?”

“No.”

Widow laughs again- even quieter this time, but it's still nice. “You’re not going to be philosophical about this one?”

“You should get to choose,” Sombra says. “If you don’t get to want what you want, if someone makes you want something you don’t, that’s gross.” She looks at Widow. “You said you want this shit? The killing and not being arm candy for some weird mustache dude? That’s cool. As long as you want it. You deserve to control that shit.”

Widow leans over and kisses her. And Sombra must really be slipping, because it surprises her. She sucks in a breath as Widow’s lips touch hers, as Widow puts an arm around her waist to steady her. It’s all Sombra can do to set a hand on Widow’s thigh and kiss back. 

Widow pulls back. “I want this,” she says. “Trust me.” Sombra laughs and kisses her, putting her hand on the back of Widow’s neck to keep her close. Sombra’s good at reading people. But it’s good to know, when you’re starting out on something new. 

**Author's Note:**

> This is part of a series I'm starting of Tarot card inspired works- thanks to [Blooming](https://twitter.com/bloomingjellies) for the insight on Tarot she provided.
> 
> I’m [@tacticalgrandma](https://twitter.com/tacticalgrandma) on twitter if you want to talk to me there!
> 
> Thank you so much for reading, and any comments or kudos would mean the world to me 💜


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